Black People : Illinois Students Lose Diplomas Over Cheers

Da Street So'ja

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she didn't get her diploma because her family cheered her while she crossed the stage to receive her diploma.

so i ask you family who is this miserable person who's killin' this girls' joy???

we tell people education is important but some fool is going to hold up her diploma because her family cheered?

we've completely lost it


http://news.aol.com/topnews/articles/_a/illinois-students-lose-diplomas-over/20070601155509990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001

here's the article


GALESBURG, Illinois (June 2) - Caisha Gayles graduated with honors last month, but she is still waiting for her diploma. The reason: the whoops of joy from the audience as she crossed the stage.

Gayles was one of five students denied diplomas from the lone public high school in Galesburg after enthusiastic friends or family members cheered for them during commencement.

About a month before the May 27 ceremony, Galesburg High students and their parents had to sign a contract promising to act in dignified way. Violators were warned they could be denied their diplomas and barred from the after-graduation party.

Many schools across the country ask spectators to hold applause and cheers until the end of graduation. But few of them enforce the policy with what some in Galesburg say are strong-arm tactics.

In Galesburg, the issue has taken on added controversy with accusations that the students were targeted because of their race: four are black and one is Hispanic. Parents say cheers also erupted for white students, and none of them was denied a diploma.

"It was like one of the worst days of my life," said Gayles, who had a 3.4 grade-point average and officially graduated, but does not have the keepsake diploma to hang on her wall. "You walk across the stage and then you can't get your diploma because of other people cheering for you. It was devastating, actually."

School officials in Galesburg, a working-class town of 34,000 that is still reeling from the 2004 shutdown of a 1,600-employee refrigerator factory, said the get-tough policy followed a 2005 commencement where hoots, hollers and even air horns drowned out much of the ceremony and nearly touched off fights in the audience when the unruly were asked to quiet down.

"Lots of parents complained that they could not hear their own child's name called," said Joel Estes, Galesburg's assistant superintendent. "And I think that led us to saying we have to do something about this to restore some dignity and honor to the ceremony so that everyone can appreciate it and enjoy it."

In Indianapolis, public school officials this year started kicking out parents and relatives who cheer. At one school, the superintendent interrupted last month's graduation to order police to remove a woman from the gymnasium.

Principal Tom Chiles said administrators who monitored the more than 2,000-seat auditorium reported only disruptions they considered "significant," and all turned in the same five names.

"Race had absolutely nothing to do with it whatsoever," Chiles said. "It is the amount of disruption at the time of the incident."

School officials said they will hear students and parents out if they appeal. Meanwhile, the school said the five students can still get their diplomas by completing eight hours of public service work, answering phones, sorting books or doing other chores for the district, situated about 150 miles southwest of Chicago.

Gayles' mother said she plans to fight the school board - in court if necessary - to get her daughter's diploma. The noise "was like three seconds. It was like, `Yay,' and that was it," Carolyn Gayles said.

American Civil Liberties Union spokesman Edward Yohnka said Galesburg's policy raises no red flags as long as it is enforced equitably. "It's probably well within the school's ability to control the decorum at an event like this," he said.

Another student who was denied her diploma, Nadia Trent, said she will probably let the school keep it if her appeals fail.

"It's not fair. Somebody could not like me and just decide to yell to get me in trouble. I can't control everyone, just the ones I gave tickets to," Trent said.


Copyright 2007 The Associated Press.
 
THAT WAS WACKED

BACK IN THE DAY ...1968 WITH A GRADUATING CLASS OF ALMOST 800 STUDENTS...YES 800...BIG FAMILIES LOL..IN AN AUDITORIUM THAT DIDNT HAVE AIR :flame: HOT...IT TOOK ALMOST THREE AND HALF HRS. BACK THEN IT WAS PART OF THE CELIBRATION. SOME PARENTS BUT AS MUCH WORK INTO THOSE DIPOLMAS AS THE STUDENTS. I HATE CENSORSHIP IN ANY FORM :censored: :censored: :censored: :censored: :censored: LOL
 
Say What?

Lol how unfair, my parents and fam cheered at my graduation so did the other parents and fam that were there and we all still got our diplomas. I dont understand why those students have to complete community service when it wasnt them that had so called "disturbed" the ceremony. They should just go ahead and mail those students their diplomas. The whole idea is silly and you know they wouldnt have done the white students like that, because there would have been an uproar about it.
 

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